WHEN John the Baptist began preaching none of us of the more
intelligent classes believed him to be really a prophet forerunning the
coming of the Messiah. Indeed, the better part of the world knew in
the beginning nothing of his presence in its midst; nor until we began
to be aware that great streams of ignorant people were pouring out of
the cities and towns and descending to listen to his preaching and to
receive his baptism, were we aware that such a man was in existence.
Then the public journals, those echoes of current thought and opinion,
began to take the matter up, publishing longer and longer reports
concerning him; commenting upon the growing excitement, the cause
of which nobody seemed exactly to understand. People read what was
printed and wondered what it all meant.
Just what those poor people who flocked to the baptism of John expected
to see or to hear--just what they expected to gain through his
ministrations, it was impossible to say. If they had any real thought
in the matter they did not tell to the world what it was they thought.
For those of the lower class do not talk freely to those of the upper
class about their ideas. With their intellectual superiors they are
reserved, suspicious, and sometimes sullen. To the trained thinker the
untrained mind appears remote, and its reasonings obscure.
When, for instance, Dr. Caiaphas's assistant gardener came to that
good clergyman in the middle of the week to ask him if he might be
absent from work till the Monday following, and when the rector of the
Church of the Advent asked the man if he were not going down to see the
Baptist and why he went, he found his question confronted by just such
logical obtuseness and inconsequence.
"Why, you see, sir," said the man, "I did promise Molly I'd take her
and her sister down to be baptized--that is, if you can spare me,
sir--and there ain't much doing just now."
"But suppose I can't spare you, Thomas?"
"Oh, well, sir, it doesn't signify. I can stay, and Molly and her
sister can go down theirselves."
It was then that the rich, wise priest tried to get at the mind of the
other man and failed.
"Why do you want to go down to the baptism, Thomas?" he said. "Don't
you get enough of God's truth preached to you at home without having to
go there to find it?"
"It's Molly wants to go more than me, sir."
"But I want you to tell me what you yourself think. Do you really
believe that this man has any more power to forgive your sins than I
have? Do you think that by baptizing you with a little water he can
wash away in a few seconds all the sins you have committed for the
thirty-six years of your life?"
"I don't know, sir."
"You don't know? Then, if you don't know, what is it you go for? I
should think you would want to know all there is to know before you ran
away from God's truth preached from His own holy word to hear what a
madman in the wilderness has to say."
"It's more on Molly's account than mine, sir. The women do think a deal
about them things, sir."
"But, I say, I want to know what you yourself think. You ask for
three or four days of time to go away from your work, to hear this man
preach. You must have some reason for doing so. Do you really believe
the blasphemous assertions of this mad preacher that Almighty God, the
Creator of the universe, is actually going to send His Messiah down
into the midst of such a rabble as is gathered there?"
"I don't need to go if you can't spare me, sir," said the
under-gardener.
Then Dr. Caiaphas gave up the unequal contest. There was no reasoning
with such inconsequence. It was like fighting the wind, and he did not
attempt it any further.
"You may go if you choose, Thomas," said he.
"Thank you, sir," said Thomas.
It is probable that few who went to the baptism of John could assign
a better reason. Dr. Caiaphas appeared to be right, and his gardener
appeared to be entirely wrong. Men of to-day know that the Truth of
John was true, and that the truth of Dr. Caiaphas was a mistake; but,
to us, illuminated with the light of our superior intelligence, it
appeared to be otherwise.
One of the journals of the day published a number of sun-pictures of
the Baptist and of his disciples. Among these the world looked upon a
picture of a baptism--the crowd gathered in a dense, motley mass upon
the shore, the Baptist standing knee-deep in the water surrounded by
penitents, upon the head of one of whom he was in the act of pouring
water. Another such picture was a portrait of the Baptist himself. He
was standing in full sunlight in front of a tent, and was surrounded
by his immediate disciples. There was a background of the same motley
crowd that characterized all the pictured groups. The central figure
was the image of a singularly wild and curious figure--lean, haggard,
unshaven. He was clad in loose trousers and shirt, over which he wore a
rough blouse of some coarse, hairy material, strapped about his waist
with a broad leather belt. His lean legs were bare, and on his feet he
wore coarse, heavy brogans. His pale eyes looked out directly at you
from under brows contracted in the glare of the sunlight. A tangled mop
of hair was brushed back behind his ears, and a shaggy beard hung down
upon his breast. One hand held a rough, crooked staff, and the other
loosely grasped a shapeless hat. The pose, the expression of the face,
the dress, all bespoke to the intelligent observer as clearly as the
word itself could have done--madness--or else fanaticism.
The upper world looked upon this picture, commented upon it, even
laughed at it; for there is something to the intelligent mind that is
almost ludicrous in the irrational and superstitious religious rites of
the ignorant and credulous lower world.
The printed words accompanying the group of pictures declared that you
had only to look upon the portrait of John the Baptist to form your own
conclusions as to what was the inspiration of all the excitement then
fermenting among the lower masses. They said that the sun-picture spoke
for itself without the need of comment, and that the Baptist either was
insane and should be placed under restraint, or else that he was an
incendiary of the most dangerous character, and should be imprisoned as
such according to the law.
It gave the writer an excellent opportunity to deliver a blow at the
political affairs of the day. "Herod," he said, "was not our choice for
subordinate governor, nor was he, we think, the choice of the better
element of the community. He was placed in his position by a strange
coalition of the classes and the masses, and he is now supported in
power by just such a rabble as are at present gathered to hear this mad
preacher's eloquence. It is very possible that Governor Herod is afraid
to enforce the law against this man, for fear he should lose the
support of that ignorant and vicious class which itself is the mainstay
of his political power. But it is a pity that all the more conservative
part of the community should be endangered by the unlicensed preaching
of this madman, simply because Herod desires to succeed himself in his
present position."
Such words as these voiced the entire thought of the law-abiding
scribes and pharisees. The logic appeared to us to be very true and
unanswerable. It is only now, in later days, that the world has come to
know that we were wrong, and the motley multitudes that surrounded John
the Baptist were right. But what thoughtful man can reasonably condemn
us for holding a position so rational as that which we maintained?